


Cruel Summer

by alessandralee



Category: Descendants (2015)
Genre: Character-centric, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-15
Updated: 2015-08-15
Packaged: 2018-04-14 21:54:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4581510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alessandralee/pseuds/alessandralee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>School's almost done for the year, and the last thing Mal wants to do is spend the summer at the Palace. What she really wants is to find someone who can teach her magic, but that's proving harder than she thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cruel Summer

**Author's Note:**

> This could maybe be the first of two (or more) parts. I'm really just seeing how this goes. Let me know if you like it.

With exactly fourteen days to go until the end of the school year, Mal should be focused on studying for finals.

Mal wants to be focused on studying for finals. Mal is trying to be focused on studying for finals.

But even when Evie forces her to pull out her Aurodon Government & Civics textbook and review, her mind slips to her summer plans. Or really, her total lack of summer plans.

Even with her mother currently housed in a spacious tank in the royal menagerie (Mal visits when she can, to make sure Maleficent received humane care), the Isle of the Lost isn’t exactly going to welcome her, or any of them, back.

Luckily for Evie, she has an internship lined up in the chemistry department of a cosmetics company, which has agreed to cover her room and board for the summer. The boys have tourney training camp in the morning, which grants them the right to stay in the dorms. Jay is teaching tourney kids camp in the afternoons, and Carlos has a part time job with a vet.

Technically, Mal has been invited to stay at the Palace for the summer, and Belle has even offered to give her extended etiquette lessons.

But Mal hates etiquette lessons. She hates sitting though formal palace dinners, where everyone either ignores her or watches her fearfully out of the corners of her eyes. She loves Ben, but there’s a lot that comes with being a king’s girlfriends that either bores her half to death or makes her feel uncomfortable.

Not the least of her worries is the knowledge that one day, maybe, the end result of being Ben’s girlfriend could mean being Aurodon’s queen.

It’s a bit much for a girl who’s just getting used to life in a strange place to wrap her head around, so Mal does her best not to think about it at all. She’s sixteen, she’s in school, she has great friends, and everything else can wait. But living in the Palace isn’t going to keep her mind at ease.

Right now, it seems like her best bet is the summer classes Doug suggested. It won’t be fun (the joy of actually going to school wore off around first semester midterms), but at least it will keep her busy. And she’ll be able to stay in the dorms with Jay and Carlos.

But what she really wants is to learn more magic. She’s made her way through the bulk of her mother’s spell book, but there’s a lot in there that she has no interest in trying.

After all, she’s in Aurodon to be good, and she’s enjoying it. Animal control spells sound like they’d send her down the wrong bath.

She tried asking Fairy Godmother for some summer tutoring. She’s thought that, with school out for the summer, the headmistress must have a little spare time for something like that.

She had been wrong. And on top of that she’d gotten a lecture.

“There’s a reason I only use magic on state occasions. After the incident with Jane at the Coronation, don’t you see the dangers of magic? After your mother, don’t you see the dangers of magic?”

That last comment had stung a bit, and briefly made her reconsider her desires.

But she’d heard all the stories (the true version, either from Ben or a book, now that they’ve made Aurodon their home), plenty of good has been done with magic. She’s still learning, but Mal knows she can be good. There’s no reason why magic can’t be a part of that.

Still, Fairy Godmother wouldn’t back down, so Mal’s stuck with browsing the summer course catalogue, hoping that something more interesting than ‘A Survey of Aurodon’s Diplomatic Relations,’ and ‘Geography of Neverland’ will magically appear.

It doesn’t, but Evie does, proclaiming, “I think I’ve found the answer the your problem.”

In an instant, Mal’s chucked the course catalogue to the foot of her bed. Part of her knows she shouldn’t get her hopes up, that magic is largely absent from Aurodon these days. But Evie knows how much this means to her, she wouldn’t say anything lightly.

“And that is?” Mal asks. Years of mimicking her mother’s practiced disdain keep her from showing her excitement, but it’s still there.

Evie sets her magic mirror and a library book down on her desk and beckons for Mal to join her.

“So I did some research,” Evie explains. “I started with this biography of famous magic users,” she gestures towards the book, it’s title reading ‘Wand and Cauldron’ in gold letters.

Mal can see a notepad marking off a page about three-quarters of the way through, and she just wants to grab the book off the desk and see what Evie found. But, as if she knew exactly what her friend would be tempted to do, Evie’s hand rests firmly on the top of the book, keeping Mal from taking it.

She’ll just have to be patient. Easier said than done.

“A lot them are back on the island,” Evie continues. “My mom, Jay’s dad, Hades, Ursula, Doctor Faciliere, not that any of them would teach you the kind of magic you want to learn.”

That’s certainly true; the last thing Mal wants is to know the kind of magic that could turn her into someone like her mother.

“Blue Fairy isn’t practicing magic anymore,” Evie reports. “The Neverland fairies are hostile to outsiders, and even my mirror can’t find Merlin these days. But I did find one potential teacher… well it’s more like three.”

“Who?” Evie can’t suppress the small smile that crosses her face.

She also can’t help but notice the nervous look on Evie’s. It takes Mal a moment to piece it together, but…

No.

Not them.

They can’t be her one shot at learning magic.

“Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather,” Evie eventually squeaks.

She flips the book open to her saved page, and Mal can see an illustration of her mother’s biggest rivals, dressed in red, green, and blue. They look older than she thought they’d be, her mother probably left that part out. There’s even less pride in being beaten by a young prince, and three old ladies.

 

It’s hopeless. She’d have a better chance of getting her mother, in her current lizard form, to teach her magic.

“There’s no one else?” Mal asks.

Evie’s notepad has a train schedule copied onto it. A tiny part of Mal is holding out hope that it will lead her to a different teacher, one that doesn’t rightfully despise her mother, one that might actually take her one.

But if she squints her eyes, she can make out a station called Greenhope Woods, which Audrey’s mentioned in passing.

Evie shakes her head, and Mal sighs in defeat.

“Maybe you could convince them,” Evie voices a hope Mal’s too cynical to have. “I mean, you did save everyone at the Coronation. That should prove you’re not like your mother. And you’ve even managed to improve things with Audrey.”

Sort of. While Mal’s pretty sure she and Audrey are never going to be friends, they’ve learned to tolerate each other’s presence. And Audrey’s grandmother can actually stand to be in Mal’s presence for more than five minutes without running away.

It’s not the most promising situation Mal’s ever found herself it, but it’s far from the worst. It might even be something she can work with.

Regardless, she’ll never learn magic if she doesn’t at least try to convince them to teach her.

Mal takes a deep breath, “Where can I find the fairies?”


End file.
